How and Why Did Judaism Survive? An Answer to Mark Twain

i want to share with you today a story it's a story that when i heard it the first time it left a very deep imprint on me it's about a debate that occurred in mcgill university in before before my days and before your days in 1958 between two people a historian of england professor arnold twinby and the israeli ambassador to canada a man named professor jacob herzog twin b was not jewish nor was he very fond of the existence of israel herzog was a great scholar a thinker israel's ambassador to canada and an advocate for israel they had a public debate toynbee was world-renowned prolific author a well-known historian till today arnold toynbee and it was a public debate toy b presented his case the case he made was judaism is similar to christianity and islam in the sense it's a religion it's not a nationality just as a british christian or an australian or italian or an american christian sheer different nationalities but the same religion jews are the same you can have a jew of australia a jew of united states a jew of russia a jew of canada ottawa they share the same religion but they're not of the same nation you are a canadian i'm an american you are a russian i'm french he's italian she's australian and therefore they're not entitled to a homeland a homeland is not for a religion a homeland is for a people for a family for a nation and jews are not a nationality they're a religion this was professor toymbi's argument in 1958 you have to understand that israel has been forced to defend itself from the day it was created as it still is forced to defend itself more than six decades later professor herzog gave a response to toynbee that was unforgettable i'm going to paraphrase his response albeit in my own words but the concept is his but for you to appreciate the response and the story he told as a response i have to raise this question because this is an important question and the question is this how did we our people survive what do i ask this question what do i mean how did we survive mark twain penned a very very famous piece in harper magazine in the late 1800s and he asked a question to which he had no answer his question was this the greatest empires and civilizations have been relegated to the dustbins of history where is ancient egypt today where is ancient assyria babylonia persia the greek empire the roman empire the byzantine empire they are in wikipedia mighty mighty nation civilizations that ruled half the world for some of them for hundreds of years and yet the rule of history is you rise in hegel's thought you rise you have your plateau and then ultimately you decline as in human life we're born we grow we reach our peak and then we go down and we end up by the worms it's true with individuals and it's true also with collective peoples groups and nations now here you have an exception called the hebrews a tiny nation we still don't constitute even one percent of humanity when i was in china once they were asking me about these jews i said how many jews do you think we are so a chinese man said based on the noise that you make probably three and a half billion i told him we're happy we're happy to get 15 million he says oh that's the amount we just had last week new ones in other words as i'm speaking they just got another million and we lost another million unfortunately to assimilation so here you have a tiny nation but it's not a nation that was isolated on an island somewhere in an african corner keeping to themselves it's a nation that every single mighty empire has targeted for abuse for persecution and usually for annihilation there's not as do you understand my dear students there's not a single generation of jewish history when a major political and military force does not blame all the world's ills on the jewish people and is determined to exterminate even in 2013 as we get together here in this lovely hotel to fresh sushi and kishka there are millions of people who really believe that the greatest thing for history would be our extermination and there is a leader of a sovereign country a member of united nations that openly calls for the destruction and annihilation of an entire country and every jewish citizen of it namely israel and this has been in every single century since the birth of the first jew abraham you know which year you'll remember this year abraham was born in 1948 since creation israel was created when 1948 after the common era abraham in the jewish calendar was born in 1948 now is 5773 in the jewish calendar israel is 1948 and israel and abraham is 1948. okay that's a trivia trivia question next and this little nation not only has it yielded tremendous influence it's changed civilization in more than one way but it survived and it thrives and the same nude nyx you know what a nudnik is there are three types of people shlamils shlomazels and nudniks the shlamil is the guy who pours the soup on the shlamazal and the nudnik is the guy who wants to know what type of soup was it this may be very relevant to this retreat the same the same nudniks who drove the world mad then are still here today and the question mark twain asked is why and how did they survive what was the mechanism what was their magic what was the tool what did they have that greek didn't have that greece didn't have that rome didn't have that babylonia didn't have what is it what was the secret ingredient to keep them alive and fresh and still creative we are here we laugh we giggle we daydream we fall asleep etc but we're alive how and why he concluded the article with a question mark he didn't have an answer despite his brilliance but i think you will agree with me my dear students that as jews we have to provide an answer to mark twain's question because if we don't understand the key ingredient that brought us here 3 300 years after our inception as a nation how will we know how to go forward if we don't appreciate what it was that brought us to this point how do we know how to forge ahead and you are here at this conference to be able to become future leaders of a nation that is tiny in numbers but has preserved a secret that you will be charged with god's grace to bring to the next generation because it's always about the youth who have the power to define what our tomorrow will look like never underestimate your gift and your indispensable value to thousands of years of our history an entire nation millions and millions of souls that lived in the past four thousand years looked down at you and in a silent whisper i can hear them beseeching you each and every one of you to figure out what was the ingredient that mark twain lacked understanding of so that you can make the faithful decision of how to forge ahead and here i ask you today at the opening of the sinai scholars conference here at the national jewish retreat of august 2013. what is the answer to mark twain's question how did we survive now if we would be having a science class and doing a scientific experiment and i don't mean to bring nightmares back from high school but if i am you could start daydreaming as you have done in high school and some of you have done in college and jews do during my speeches all the time and then you'll come back whenever you're ready you're welcome to come back and return at your convenience at your luxury you could take a first-class ticket to australia and knock yourself out in your daydream as you wish you can fall in love with whoever you want as long as you come back to reality and i will be here to give you a hug as you sober up so if we would be doing a scientific experiment and we asked this question we see an object that survives through various climates and various situations and circumstances and we want to understand what are the key features of its survival what will the scientist what will the researcher look for he will look for what we call the constants he will look for the character or she will search for the characteristics that are always present for example if you see something that survived for 500 years under it difficult conditions you will not attribute its power of endurance to a temporary characteristic that was sometimes present and sometimes not present because that cannot explain logically the power of its endurance during the times when it lacked that characteristic rather you will search for something that was with it forever throughout the entire period of time and then perhaps you can attribute its survival to that and if you have three such features now you have to research which one is essential and which one is not so consequential if you only have one feature that is a constant and everything else changes and fluctuates it's logical and objective to assume that we have to credit the power of endurance to that constant feature and here i ask you a simple question we are a nation we're all children of parents who are children of parents back back back back although sometimes we get very self-centered and we see our mothers and fathers as annoying or worse nonetheless we come from somewhere thousands of years back is there one characteristic that has been with the jewish people from the day we became a nation three and a half thousand years ago and accompanied us as a people constantly through thick and thin good times and bad times through our exile through every country in the world until this very day as i stand here in front of you or there is not even one constant if we could find two constant features then we have to ask the second question which one should we credit with allowing us to survive if there's only one feature logic is probably to attribute it to that feature so we ask and we go straight to what would seem the most logical what keeps a nation together a homeland a nationality we're americans those who are americans we live in the united states of america the canadians among us live in canada yes yes we like you don't worry and the brits the brits they live in britain it's the homeland it's the soil of the country that unites us as a people perhaps you know why we survived three and a half thousand years we were in a unified cohesive homeland we live together in our national homeland and that kept us is that the case sadly from most of our history 98 of jews have been exiled from their homeland dispersed throughout the entire globe so that doesn't do it that's not a constant for the minority of our history were we in israel till 1948 there were always jews in israel but very few most of our history is outside the land of israel so you say okay it's not a land probably this nation had an army we had an army that always protected us for three and a half thousand years it defended us it fought off all aggressors and that's why we're here is that true unfortunately for most of our history we were defenseless thank god today israel has a strong army the idf and we pray for them but unfortunately for most of our history we were scattered without any army defending us and protecting us so you might say what is the binding factor of jewish history culture jewish culture but if you know anything about jews you know that jewish culture varies from milieu to milieu jews basically adopted the culture of their hosts some jews don't even know what gefilte fishes some jews don't know what schog is the culture of yemeni jews is not the culture of ashkenazic jews the culture of iraqi jews is completely not the culture of german jews culture of polish jews i student is not the culture of spanish to sparta jews different cultures perhaps it was language a language holds a people together is there one language that old jews spoke in the past three thousand years absolutely not most jews for most of our history didn't even know hebrew they adopted usually the language of their host or a different language aramaic you know much of our prayers are in aramaic including the kadish is kadash yiddish or other countries or other or other languages ladino or the country of our host like now i'm speaking in english for a reason [Applause] thank you for the applause but can you repeat what i said okay very good very good god willing next year when you come back and i'll speak to you i'll be able to speak to you in hebrew but hopefully you'll bring your friends who won't understand hebrews so they'll speak in english and then the year after they'll know hebrew but we know that so many of us don't know that language so it's not the language so now i ask you a question is there one characteristic that has accompanied your people our people for the last three and a half thousand years continuously if it's not a homeland and not an army and not a culture and not a language and not a particular type of food is there anything or maybe nothing if there's nothing new if there's 20 things i have to start researching but what if i only find one thing and i see that that thing did not exist among any other nation that perished wouldn't the skeptic scientist objective mind within me start asking maybe i have to give that thing more credence than many jewish leaders thinkers professors scholars authors politicians journalists pay tribute to and now i come back to mcgill university in 1958 you remember the debate between arnold toimbian jacob herzog first names please very important arnold toynbee jacob herzog toymbi says we're not a nation we don't need a homeland we're a religion jacob herzog turns to professor toynbee packed house in mcgill and says i'm going to tell you a story three olympic airplanes land from heaven in three distinct airports the first airplane lands in athens how many of you have been to athens it lands in athens in greece out of the plane comes an old man with an impressive demeanor an impressive beard pointing upward and when the airport attendant greets him he asks this elderly man what is your name the man says my name is socrates the airport attended says um i have an uncle with a similar name maybe you're related to me he says i doubt i'm related to you what brings you here old man socrates socrates says what brings me here you want to know what brings me to athens yes what brings you here he says take me to the acropolis and you'll see where i conceived and gave birth to greek philosophy where the sages of the sages of athens sat and mused about the truths of the world the truths of the universe take me to the acropolis so i could observe firsthand how greek philosophy is flourishing and the man says the acropolis it's in ruins for nine dollars and fifty cents i can give you a tour through the runes he says the acropolis is in ruins absolutely yes so tell me he says how is the greek empire doing he says greek empire what empire when empire we're barely struggling to survive greece is of soros you know what soros is we have problems never-ending problems we don't even realize if we don't know if we're gonna have a budget what do you mean what happened to the greek empire he says we don't have an empire we have a country called greece it's a member of nato socrates says what in the world is nato so he starts giving him a lecture about nato he says is the world saturated with greek philosophy he says i hate to tell you nobody's really interested in greek philosophy i mean there's a few scholars who still read the republic who are still into mr socrates and mr plato and mr aristotle but most students are discussed more their iphones socrates says what's the language you're speaking in you don't you speak in the ancient greek language he says no no no no we don't know ancient gree socrates says can you please tell them take me to the temple of zeus he says what zeus the temple of zeus the god zeus he says we don't got no god zeus so what do you have who do you worship he says we have the greek orthodox church he says what's the greek worth the next church he says don't you know about the church no socrates what's the church he says christianity jesus you don't know these things no socrates says i don't know about this i know about zeus this is not my greece this is not my athens i am out of here he gets back on the olympic plane and he bids fear well to a glorious past that is no more a second olympic airplane lands in rome in italy an old man impressive impressive posture walks out you can see he's a statement he's a statesman and he's fearless the airport attendant approaches him and says welcome to rome what is your name the man says julius caesar julius caesar ah like the caesar salad you made the caesar salad he says what caesar salad caesar the caesar of rome tell me how are the roman caesars doing how is the roman empire he says mr julius i don't know how to break this to you that no caesars are ready for 1500 years and no roman empire he said so what is rome rome is a city where in italy what's italy it's a country it's a member of nato what's nato he gives him the nato lecture founded in 1946 blah blah european union he says tell me can you take me to the steps of the senate he says why do you have to go to the steps of the senate he says i have endured a lot of agony on the steps of the senate a two brute a then caesar falls i wanna revisit it he says there's no steps of the senate it's destroyed for more than a millennium he says take me to the colosseum he says for eight dollars and fifty cents you could see the ruins of the coliseum take me to my gladiators he says gladiators seven dollars and 25 cents you could see the ruins of the gladiators take me to my circuses and gymnasiums they don't exist so what do you have in rome we have the vatican he says how is the roman empire doing does the world still tremble when they hear the name rome he says i don't know how to break this to you rome is just a city some tourists come to hear the pope he says what's the pope pope is a guy who believes you have to be celibate in the original text that said celebrate but he read it as celibate they don't get married whatever he gives him this bill about the pope he says take me take me to worship the god of jupiter he says there's no god of jupiter i told you there's a pope caesar looks at him and says why aren't you speaking to me in latin the way i speak to you he says sir mr season nobody speaks latin anymore there's a few phds who do latin we speak other languages here we speak italian and we eat pizza and pasta you want pizza i can give you some pizza and julius caesar looks at him and says this is not my realm i'm out of here he gets on the olympic plane and he leaves a third olympic plane lands you know in which city tel aviv ben gurion airport as some of you just landed a little while ago israelis [Music] [Applause] me included but we didn't get the olympic plane we got a different plane here here's an olympic airplane lands in ben gurion airport in tel aviv a fl airport employee runs up the steps an old man walks out he looks at the old man and he says two words what were the two words shalom alaikam peace unto you and the old man gives him a hand and says two words alechem shalom unto you peace the airport employee looks at him and says what's your name what is your name and the old man says my name is moshe moses motion and the airport employee says hey come on my name is give me a hug you want a laugher you want lafayette we have a lot for you moshe with chips with falafel balls kharif yeah good good more more chips 19 shekel [Applause] he says the airport employee the import employee says says marcia marsha where are you from and the old man says i'm from egypt and the flight employee says and i am from tibilisi georgia tybelisi i made aliyah seven months ago i came here they already ripped me off they ripped me off these jews i'm from tbilisi you're from egypt wow moshe from egypt what brings you here and moshe from egypt says it's my land moshe have you been here and moshe from egypt says no so moshe from georgia says so why do you call it your land he says because i dreamt a lot about this land i worked tirelessly for this land i made it to the border of this land but i never entered into the land but it's my land old man moshe looks at moshe from tibilisi and says forgive me if you don't understand my question i just have to ask i came here on an express flight and i realized i forgot something very precious to me i don't know if you know what it is but i forgot something that's called talit and to fill in you think i could find somewhere to fill in and moshe from georgia looks at him and says who do you think you are amnesty phil and i just put on fill in here look pulls up his sleeve you see i just finished putting on filling you're holier than now you think you're the only religious guy i also put on villain and now you're already coming from egypt and you think you're god's gift to humanity you're the only orthodox jew puts on filling moshe from egypt says you have to fill them i can borrow them i'm not jewish you're the only jew you're pompous i drew just like you i'm more jew than you i'm from georgia you're from egypt you're from morsi's country i'm from georgia from stalin's country moshe says wow you have to fill in yeah they go off the plane they come into the airport old man moshe says you know i've been fasting now for 40 days and 40 nights i'm starving you think they have food he says food 180 restaurants in the benguryon airport moshe says you don't understand i don't eat all foods forgive me for my question i eat only kosher you know what kosher is the man gets insulted here you can you come you come from egypt to israel you think you're the only guy who knows what judaism is every store here is kosher and different types of kosher there is kosher there's mahadrin there's this right-wing kosher left-wing kosher centrist kosher orthodox kosher fundamentalist orthodox kosher acidic kosher mayo sharing kosher boropor kosher every type of kosher you have you have lafa you have lafa with chips with onions without onions with radish more kosher less kosher and the ice cream a hundred types of ice cream one of you will certainly kill you but they're all kosher moshe says you have kosher he walks into a restaurant to buy something and see something on the door he asks his helper from georgia what's this on the door he says marsha from egypt now you gotta be nervous an old man like you doesn't know what's on the door shame on you that's a mezuzah he says what's on your mezuzah you don't know in the mesozoic parchment on the parchment there's ink portions of the bible what god told moses and we kiss it and moshe sheds two pearls that stream down from his eyes and look like tears as he puts his hand on the mezuzah and gives it a kiss and then his friend from georgia says and now i'll show you something nice and he brings him in to a jewish school and there's a teacher sitting with children and he's reading to them in hebrew these words [Applause] and god spoke to moses saying and moses smiles professor herzog turns to professor toying me in mcgill university and he says professor toymbi socrates the greatest greek philosopher who ever lived on one of the greatest minds in human history julius caesar the most celebrated roman general caesar and statesman come back to their native countries the countries that you call nations nationalities the countries upon which you confer the attribute of a homeland caesar comes to rome socrates comes to athens to greece they don't speak the same language they don't have the same faith they don't share the same lifestyle they don't worship the same god they don't have the same rituals they lack the same culture they don't have the same interests they don't have the same convictions passions ideals and values there's almost nothing of the greece of today that mirrors the greece of yesteryear there's almost nothing in the rome of today that mirrors the rome of yesteryear and yet you call greece and italy authentic nations moses comes to tel aviv today the same language the same faith the same heritage the same traditions rituals commandments the same lifestyle the same culture the same mitzvoth the same education the same commandments the same trends and patterns and values and faith the same shabbat the same mezuzah the same feeling the same coach for the same torah of three and a half thousand years ago still there that's not a nation professor toimbi if israel is not a nation if the jewish people are not a people then you professor tweenby you tell me what is a people what is it that constitutes a nation was for once in his career silent this is the answer to mark twain's question there was one feature that accompanied us what is it it's called the torah and it's mitzvot for three and a half thousand years from new zealand to peru from russia to galician hungary from western europe central europe eastern europe south africa north america south america wherever jews were good times bad times exhilarated times horrific times they did not unfortunately have a homeland or a language or an army or a culture but they preserved and they celebrate it the torah and its daily mitzvot day in day out with self-sacrifice and commitment and they bequeathed it to their children and youngsters and grandchildren with love and dedication wherever they were and under all circumstances the skeptic scientist when studying jewish history and asking mark twain's question what are the ingredients that can explain the mystique of our eternity and we see there's one thing namely one feature that was always there the torah and the mitzvos brings i believe an objective mind to ask this question if that is the key ingredient what is the most important ingredient that we as a people need in order to write the next chapter of jewish history with pride and dignity and joy and the answer is what your students what you are doing right here today coming together to study to explore to climb the ladder of jewish wisdom and the celebration of jewish life so today that torch is handed over to you and we say go and march on the road of your people on eternal people thank you very much click subscribe to see more exclusive content for the most sought after jewish speakers teachers and thinkers

Channel: Jewish Learning Institute

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Id: 9364pNlpQLg

Length: 38min 10sec (2290 seconds)

Published: Thu May 06 2021